Study of Frozen Section Biopsy as Intraoperative Procedure for Oral Squamous Cell Carcinoma in BSMMU

Abstract

Background: Frozen section biopsy technique often helps a rapid diagnosis of a mass during surgery which in turn may helps a surgeon to know the status of the margins of his resection before closing.

Objective: The study was done to achieve tumour free surgical margin after resection of oral squamous cell carcinoma (OSCC). The study also examined to determine positive margins and its relation to tumour size, grade and stage of oral squamous cell carcinoma.

Method: This cross sectional study was done in 29 patients of oral sqamous cell carcinoma.

Result: One hundred eleven margins of frozen section (FS) biopsy were taken from 29 patients (mean 3.8) for comparing with the permanent sections of the same tissue sample. Among them, one false positive and three false negative were found and an accuracy rate was 96.4%. Out of one hundred eleven margins, 32 (28.8%) were positive and 79 (71.2%) were negative. In case of T3 and T4 tumour, the number of the positive margins was greater (respectively 27.8% and 50%). In stage III and stage IV cases, the number of positive margins was greater (29.1 and 30% respectively). Regarding histopathology grading, grade III was the highest (33.3%).

Conclusion: The intra-operative frozen section biopsy plays an important role to achieve tumour free surgical margin in the resection of oral squamous cell carcinoma. In this study, it was also observed that the number of positive margins increased in relation to increased tumour size and tumour stage (cTNM).

Key Words: Oral squamous cell carcinoma; Frozen section biopsy; Radiotherapy; Chemotherapy.

DOI: 10.3329/bsmmuj.v2i1.3704

BSMMU J 2009; 2(1): 8-13